Hello, this is the second chapter to my Plush Toy thing! I rather liked the first chapter, so I've decided that I won't just suddenly cut it off and switch to the next day!

By the way, Fëanor can speak English because Melkor just totally knows how to ruin a human's good mood by introducing them to Fëanor's sharp tongue. Though I imagine that he'd probably mistake me for an Elf, since I'm pretty much as tall as one and my ears would usually be covered by my hair.

-O-

Quickly, I dressed myself after mopping water from my skin, and I stepped out into the hallway, cursing my slippers for being so loud against the floor. Turning my head to and fro, I spotted no one in the hallway and moved down to the living room, cautiously tip-toeing to the intersection. And then I saw him; he was tall, even taller than me. I blinked several times and tried rubbing my eyes to no avail; there was a (surely) six and a half foot tall man in my living room - and he had pointy ears?

"Who are you?" I asked hoarsely, my throat dry. My day just went completely downhill from receiving that stupid letter...

He turned to me, and his dark grey eyes narrowed. "You are not an Elf?"

I stepped back. "I'm a human." This guy...he had the nerve to accuse me of being an Elf when he was taller than me? Probably by a lot of centimeters, judging by the fact that he was almost as tall as three of my 65 centimeter desks propped up on each other.

"Of the race of Man," he clarified to himself. Then, he muttered, "As long as you are not of the Vanyar..."

"Vanyar?" And then it hit me. Holy shit. Oh lord, this could not be possible—I was dreaming, and I'd really dreamt up all this crap. "I'm sorry, but I'm not fictional."

He raised a fine eyebrow at me, and I could tell that he was scrutinising me from where I stood. "Fictional? I am sorry as well, but I am not fictional at all. I am in no way made up or unreal." To prove his point he held up the card that had fallen to the floor after I swiped it off my desk, and he tore it in half, and then quarters, and then eigths. "See? Very palpable."

I blanched when he had ripped the card—then I regained my senses after the second ripping. "No! What have you done? You just killed my only chance of deducing this madness!" I went to the ripped halves of the card and knelt down, eyes wide with horror.

Though I couldn't see him, I could tell that he had rolled his eyes. "You can easily piece it back together. It was only a demonstration."

"Only a demonstration," I echoed, gathering the pieces and completely disregarding the fact that an Elf, may he be real or just a figment of my imagination, was in my house and had just ripped a card into eight pieces instead of killing me. "I think I need to sit down."

"There's a couch, right here," he replied, gesturing sarcastically and rather elegantly to the piece of furniture.

I plopped down on it, sitting as far away from him as possible. "Are you really real? As in, I'm not dreaming?"

"You're not dreaming. Would you like me to pinch you, or use a knife to—"

"No thank you," I said all too quickly. "I'll pinch myself." To no avail. Damn pinching; it didn't work. The idea with the knife was starting to look really attractive to me, but before I knew it, my wrist was in my mouth, and I bit down. When I tasted blood—much like back then—I knew I was not dreaming. I also knew that I was quite screwed and in deep, deep dung, and someone was going to sue me for taking away a character in Tolkien's work.

But why would I automatically jump to that conclusion? I asked myself.

"You're a cosplayer, aren't you?" I exclaimed, jumping up and backing away. "How the hell did you get in my house anyway? And how did you get such realistic ears?"

"What is a cosplayer?" he asked flatly. I could see his fingers twitching, as if reaching for a sword that did not hang from his belt, but was in fact in my storage closet. I stepped back several feet until there was a respectable distance, but the apprehension still remained.

"A guy who dresses up as a character from some sort of fictional piece of work, like animation or novels." I took in a deep breath. "Why are you in my house? Stop avoiding the question." I pulled the lamp, from the table, to me, causing the cord to yank itself out of place. The sound was not pleasant. Rather, I could see my neck making that very same sound, except louder and with a crisper sound, and the gesture would have been a little more graceful.

He lifted his head and looked extremely proud as he told me, and looked down at me from the bridge of his nose, "No one can mimic me so grandly, for I am the renowned and infamous Fëanáro whom many may harbour ill will towards, but grudging admiration as well."

This was really getting out of hand. I needed a foolproof method, and I needed some Valium or Vicodin. Something to relax my nerves. "...Then can I feel your ears?"

"What?" It was his turn to look aghast as he raised his hands to cover his ears protectively. Then he shot glaring daggers at me.

"Feel. Your. Ears. So I can deduct whether or not they're fake, and whether or not I should believe you."

"I would much rather you hold a knife to my wrist and test my tangibility as such, instead of feeling my ears, thank you," Fëanáro answered, backing away from me. His hands I could see were calloused, but his fingers were long and elegant. And curling up as he backed away from me. I suddenly perceived the horrible image of him using those fingers to cut off my oxygen, and I started to back away as well, wishing that I had my sword in a much more convenient place to reach instead of my storage room, which was on the other side of the apartment.

I sighed. "Okay. Let's go about this peacefully, with no injuries to the other, okay? I really would like for us to resolve this problem so I have time to study. And I'd like for you not to, um, strangle...me. I'm not sure about you being an Elf, and maybe I don't have to feel your ears, but some proof would be nice."

"I would not show you this if I had the choice, but..." He reluctantly pulled his cloak up for me to see, and three lights assaulted my eyes.

I backed away even further and nearly tripped over my cheap, antique rug. "Ow, ow, ow, my eyes, what are you doing? Flashing me with lights?"

The blinding light ebbed away and left me with three sparkling jewels. Then, he took one from the cloak, and threw it down from where he stood. As I realised that it hadn't broken and certainly caused a dent in the floor, dread almost overwhelmed me as I was reminded of the storyline in The Silmarillion. And I thought to myself, Holy—no way no way no way no way, oh my god this cannot be good!

"What are you doing!" I exclaimed. "Put that away before - " Then I faltered in my command. Morgoth wasn't here...oh shit. Oh no. "Wait..." I leapt over to the box and held up the label stuck to it. "No way. Just...why. No way. No way in hell." Melkor's Plush Toys. "Melkor's. Plush. Toys?" I repeated to myself incredulously.

Fëanáro glared at the box. "What? Morgoth? Give me that box—I will destroy it right now."

"Wait," I said. "Wait." I removed all of the packaging tissue paper and found a small pamphlet. I opened it very slowly and started to read aloud. "Congratulations, you have just received a plush toy for trial." My voice went flat. "This is Curufinwë Fëanáro, son of Finwë and Míriel Serindë, that you have received." I skipped down to the last paragraph. "You cannot return him for six months if he has grown to full size. Sincere apologies if your home is wrecked in the process."

He took the pamphlet from me. "Okay. Let us read the Important Points. I was apparently a plush toy. I have now grown to full size. I cannot be returned for six months. I am to remain under your jurisdiction—I very much argue to that—and I cannot set fire to anything... Oh come off of it, I only did that to the ships and Indis's handkerchief. Morever, if arguments should arise, I will...be overtaken with a pain? This is slave-driving."

"Okay; one, I do not slave-drive. Two, let's get this straight. You're seriously Fëanáro from The Silmarillion?"

"Yes. Who are you?"

"Drew Canterbury. Student from the University next door."

He simply rolled his eyes. "That is not a very detailed answer. I gave you my detailed answer, or rather, the pamphlet and I gave you my detailed answer, which was, 'Fëanáro son of Finwë and Míriel Serindë,' and I shall add to it. Creator of the Silmarils, father of seven sons, exiled Crown Prince of the Noldor, and greatest of the Noldor. Now, what have you to say?"

Pride is a really funny thing, when it comes to life-threatening situations. Though I already knew of Fëanáro and his pride, mine didn't nearly as much rival his but still pulled through. "Drew daughter of Lukas and Maeva, swordfighter age 18, part-time waitress at the Golden Rim on Fridays, and worker at the Eberstark Bookstore on Wednesdays and Saturdays."

"Then, Drew, I believe that is a proper answer," he told me, amusement twinkling in his eyes.

I silently rubbed my temples as I sat in the quiet bookstore, trying to gather my thoughts, though I never tried doing it before. I hadn't had coffee that morning because I woke up late after attempting to stay awake in case Fëanáro tried something such as burning down my apartment. I hadn't called Freyr that morning either, since I knew he would be at work, and Aksel would have been asleep, since he was in Norway already and still adjusting to the time zone. But it was really better for sanity, sitting alone in a quiet place and focusing on something other than certain looming problems...

Until someone interrupted me.

"Um, hello, do you mind helping me find a book?"

I glanced up at the girl, and her face was young and innocent, a cherub face surrounded by a crown of dark brown hair and a strip of it dyed red. Slowly, I nodded and got up, wincing at how sore I felt. Sitting alone in a quiet place may have been good for the sanity (not really mine), but sitting in the same position for a long time was bad for the joints.

"What book? And how many do you need?" I asked her.

She seemed startled out of her thoughts as I spoke, most likely stunned by my height. Most people were, anyway.

"Oh! Right, well, I'm searching for a book on violins - my sister's friend needs only one, and my sister is outside. She can't come in," she added, answering my unspoken question.

I turned my head to the window door and saw a similar girl, taller than her, but with dark blue eyes instead of light brown. She was smoking outside of the bookstore. Sighing, I directed the little girl to the music section and picked a book (the best, in my opinion) out for her, carrying it to the cashier. Edina exchanged glances with me as she scanned the barcode on the book. I waited as the little girl paid and walked her outside to the door, where her sister shot me a glare and snuffed her cigarette, tossing it away onto the pavement. Bending down, I searched those soft brown eyes.

"Tell your sister's friend," I said, "that books won't help her much. If she wants to learn how to play, she's got to have a tutor to teach her some of these things." Then I patted her on the shoulder and nudged the door open for her. She nodded serenely and skipped outside, holding the book to her like a precious item.

I went back to Edina—and she said to me, "Soft spot for kids, eh? Most of them would probably be frightened by your height."

"And yours," I retorted good naturedly.

She grinned. "I'm not as tall as you, you monster. How tall are you again?"

"Last time I checked, which was last year, I was 177 centimeters tall. What about you?"

She cursed. "Verdammt, I'm 174. I guess you can see the difference, eh? 'The Europeans are always so damn tall,'" she said, mimicking the customer from last week who had asked her out on an outing, on which they talked and she disclosed that she was German and her height was as such, and he replied that he was Mexican, felt quite short, and he only used feet as a unit of measurement. She had laughed and told him about me, tall and just really towering over most people, and he paled, saying, 'The Europeans are always so damn tall.'

Though I had to disagree; the Finnish trillinger were just of average height, but that was probably because they were only fifteen and not fully grown yet. When I was eleven, I already wished I would stop growing, but I still grew. My legs only seemed to be getting longer until finally they halted. Yet so many people teased me, and I was nearly as tall as Freyr when finally, Odin or Frigga or someone stopped the process.

"It's really too bad," I told her. "To think that I'd be the one labeled as a freak because I'm so tall - and I thought I actually found someone who could be standing as my equal!"

She snorted. "I am your equal. I level out your coldness with my bubbliness, and your height by mine, because I am the awesome friend."

"Coldness?" I protested.

"You have to know how boss-like you look! It's scary to most children, you know, and a lot of guys."

"Thanks for boosting my confidence."

"Excuse me," interrupted a voice. It was slightly high-pitched and raspy. "Are you that tall girl who helped my sister?"

Edina shifted her position to look around me, and her eyes narrowed. I turned around and saw the girl who was smoking outside earlier. I nodded wordlessly.

She smiled sardonically and handed me a card, messily scrawled in pencil. "Go to this address tomorrow at four-thirty sharp. The theatre's on the University campus, and since you look like a student there, I'm assuming you'll know how to get in the gates." She glanced over my head, as if silently cursing my height for removing some of her authority, and repeated, "Remember, four-thirty sharp. She doesn't like to wait."

"Okay," I replied. "But why does your little sister want to see me?"

"That little runt? Not her. The one that wanted the book, nimrod. My friend."

Right, I thought to myself as she strutted out of the bookstore.

Edina made a contemptuous sound in the back of her throat. "Little snot - who does she think she is? Has she got something screwed on wrong in her brain, trying to take on two tall as hell Europeans? Doesn't even look like a University student." I smiled at Edina, and she covered her eyes dramatically, cringing away from the register. "Ah! The giant is smiling! The world is ending!"

"No, seriously, Edina," I said. "I really wish you went to this University. Do you think you could apply with grants and scholarships?"

"And become a freshie? Hell no."

"Come on, Edina..."

"Drew, I think I'll just stay here and work at my family bookstore. College never really hit the right chord with me, and I'm not sure I'm ready to begin. Now, I don't know about leaving you to the hungry jaws of your tight-ass colleagues, because I feel bad about that, but you could always drop out of college and work full-time at this bookstore, though I know you wouldn't, because therefore all of your grants and scholarships would be useless and you would've totally spat in the face of financial aid and all of the other students who couldn't get in."

"You make it sound like a miracle."

"Not many people can get into college or universities with grants and scholarships alone, you know."

"But I'm not. I work so I can pay off debt."

"And you honestly think that I want to go through that?" She sighed and ran a hand through her dirty blonde hair. "Come on, Drew. That's just not the life for me."

"I guess," I sighed, and went back to the table to sit down.

Then, Edina tossed something at me, and it very nearly clonked me on the head, hitting my hand that had gone up to protect my face, and landing in my other hand which I had held out to catch it with. I turned to her questioningly.

"What is this?"

"Open it," she replied, and carelessly pressed open the register.

I did as she said, and I heard the clinking of metal hitting metal. Car keys. My mouth parted in surprise. "You didn't buy me a car...did you? Oh god, you know I can't take this."

"No, you idiot, I know you don't have one, so I decided to lend you mine." She sighed and shook her head teasingly. "Seriously, Drew! How else are you going to get to your University's theatre? Walk there from your freaking apartment which I know is off campus and pretty far away? Even if you get on a transit bus and get outside the University gates, like how the hell are you going to walk such a damn long distance before your legs give out?"

I frowned. "I always walk to school. Unless I'm sick. Then I don't walk, I talk the transit bus and hope someone will take up a hitchhiker."

"You have the inner derelict," she told me, all very serious. "I don't think I know you anymore. You walk to school? Nobody's done that since high school, and I know you're in your sophmore year here! You got to be kidding me!"

"Alright, alright, so I'm a bit weird on that! It's good exercise, since I barely get any per day."

"You walk to class."

"That doesn't count. Everyone walks to class. Therefore, it should be excused as conformity."

"You are not conformed. You, of all people, should not be conformed."

"So...you work on Wednesdays, Fridays, and Saturdays," Fëanáro confirmed, sitting at my desk and reading one of my Chemistry books. He didn't even look at me, immersed in his book but coherent enough to speak nonchalantly to me. His brow was drawn up in slight interest as he flipped another page.

I nodded towards him as I carefully pulled our dinner—heat-friendly—from the microwave. Then I turned to him with a grimace, and he grimaced as well, seeing the burnt edge of the lasagna. But he was more focused on what the hell it was.

"May I ask what that is, in the odd pan?" he deadpanned, taking it from me without qualm.

"Careful! It's...hot..." I trailed off as he, without any 'Ow!' or 'Damn that's burning!', placed the plastic pan on the table. "Okay. You must be Super Elf or something. How did you do that without cursing once? That's weird."

"No." He gave me a questioning look, as if saying, 'Super Elf? What?' "I worked in the forge. I've had to deal with hotter things than this." He smirked. "I touched actual blue fire. And contained it into my renowned lamps. Do not underestimate me." And I could tell, by the look on his face, that he wished to add, 'A mere person may not be able to handle this, but I am not a mere person.'

I sighed. "Okay. Do you want to eat this now or eat it later?"

"I prefer not to ingest it. It looks...bloody."

"Are you criticizing my taste in food?" When he didn't respond, I felt annoyed. "That's it. Tomorrow, I'm taking you to McDonalds and ordering you a Big Mac with extra salty fries. Let's see you hold your resolve that lasagna is horrible. I don't believe it." Then I took two styrofoam plates from the cabinet and handed one to him. "Here. At least try some of it. Lots of Americans love Italian food. Even I love Italian food. And I'm not even American. So I don't think that Noldorin Elves hate lasagna."

Fëanáro grudgingly took the plate from me and took the big fork, scooping up one serving of it. I could tell he was intending to force it down. Was it really that bad? I mean, he killed people, staining sand with blood, but he couldn't eat something that looked bloody. How the hell did that work?

Oh shit.

He killed people.

"Fëanáro," I said, holding a hand out. "If you don't want to eat it, you don't have to..." Mostly because I fear for my life and if you kill me, no one's going to buy food tomorrow. Then I remembered the 'if arguments should arise' sentence, and I lowered my hand.

He simply wrinkled his nose, took a silver fork from one of the kitchen drawers, and held up a strand of lasagna to his eye. His frown was slightly noticeable, though I could tell he was trying to hide it from me. "What is this made of?"

"Tomato, cheese, pasta... Okay, truth be told, I don't know anything else besides those three."

"You're eating something, and you don't even know what it's made of?"

He had a good point... "Hey, I'm not eating it right now. You are."

Then, he lowered the fork into his mouth, and his eyes widened a fraction. I waited. He seemed to be trying to swallow it down when he rushed to the trash can and knelt over onto the floor, completely spitting out the lasagna and ignoring my look of incredulity.

"It wasn't that bad, was it?" I asked.

"Tomorrow, I'm cooking," he declared, rising from his knees and turning to me. "We're going for ingredients, and I'm cooking. You cannot honestly expect to survive on such things that taste nearly like burnt ash, and I've had to taste burnt ash to make ink."

"That's because you ate the burnt part," I protested. "You can't honestly expect something blackened from the whole to taste like heavenly waybread. You need to give Italian food a chance."

His eyes narrowed. Oh god, the thoughts about him killing me were coming back... "I'll cook tomorrow, and if my cooking is not good enough for your tastes, then you may force me to indulge in your odd eating habits."

"How are you so sure that you'll win?" Besides the fact that I knew he would win since I would practically eat anything but hot dogs and hákarl—oh and surströmming.

He simply turned away and dumped the remainder of his lasagna into the same trash can. "I am not only the greatest of the Noldor because of my craft and ingenuity, Drew Canterbury. You will soon find out. Just wait tomorrow."

I guess I would have to borrow Edina's car a bit longer then...

-O-

So, wow! Nearly a pretty long chapter! Longer than the first one, anyway.

Translations:

German:
Verdammt - damn
Eberstark - strong as a boar

Oh, you know, hákarl and surströmming is my worst nightmare. If you forced it down my throat, I guarantee I would gag. Trust me. I was dared to eat either of them, and I chose the former - and had to drink some wine to keep it down and dull my tastebuds. Scarred for life.

Also, I wasn't sure on how to characterise Fëanor. But there's a reason why he hasn't murdered me yet.

Anyway, tell me how you thought of it...

...or I'll send you surströmming.